More than 12,000 MP3 players, 9,000 pairs of trainers and nearly two million Christmas decorations are part of the largest ever consignment of Christmas goods to reach Europe.

Arriving on Saturday at Suffolk, the Emma Maersk 3 is a quarter mile long (397 metres), can carry over 11,000 containers, is powered by the world’s largest diesel engine and has a propeller weighing 130 tonnes.

The boat bares witness to the huge growth of goods coming to Europe from China since it’s entry into the World Trade Organisation.

Yentian port, where the Emma Maersk departed, now exports more than 30,000 containers a day and China is now the world’s biggest maker and exporter of toys, steel and electrical goods.

But trade between China and Europe to is very much one-way traffic, raising fears more than a million jobs in European agriculture and textiles could be lost within a year.

Caroline Lucas, green MEP for south-east England told the Guardian, that the Emma Maersk reflected a worrying trend in the movement of goods from China.

"These are the goods that Europe used to make. We are faced with a country that has almost absolute advantage in an increase number of sectors.

"This is a triumph for multinational capital, not for Chinese workers who, as well as suffering from some of the world’s worst labour exploitation on record, are also losing jobs at a phenomenal rate."